I was the original OP for "40 times...My Amp Lee story". In that posts several wondered who am I and what is my story (as I explained I was not Marion Butts). Further, periodically throughout the years of being a Warchant member I would get asked the same question when I bought forth truthful little stories or insight on some past players or local S. Florida recruits. Even then I never divuldeged who I am or what I know. However, as promised in that posts I will share "My Own story". So, what I'm about to tell you I have not shared with anybody except my immediate family (sons, wife and Mom) and closest of closest friends. Lastly, I will NOT divulge things that could potentially get a school, or some coach, or some player in trouble (you'll have to read between the lines). But I will tell you the 100% truth and I think you'll see why I love FSU soooo much once you look at my story from eyes:
BEFORE FSU - Baseball was my first love and a guy named Mickey Rivers who played for the Yankees was a good friend of my uncle Bob. Mickey taught me how to play baseball as a little kid in 1st grade and I would spend time with him at the local baseball park, as well as go to the Yankees spring training that they had here in S. Florida at the time. From 1st grade through 9th grade I made every All Star team there is to make in baseball as a Center fielder and Frist Baseman in the competitive Miami Baseball leagues. In fact I played at the same youth baseball park with Danny Tartabull (former Royal and Yankees) and his younger brother Jose who was my age. Danny, Jose and their Father spent countless hours trying to convince me to focus solely only on baseball and give up playing football when I was young because they said I was so skilled and gifted in the field and running the bases as a youngster. They wanted me to travel with them for their winter baseball club (like a AAU baseball team). Danny, Jose and several of the players I played with went onto to win a Baseball State Championship for our local high school team Miami Carol City (several of those same players went onto play in the big leagues). l quit in the 9th grade to focus on football (thanks to Oklahoma -Barry Switzer). Funny thing, a few years after high school I remember Jose (Danny's little brother who was my age) telling me there was a guy in the Seattle Mariners farm system on his team (I think either AA or AAA at the time) who played just like me and to remember his name...Ken Grifffey!. By the way, I never had the guts to tell Mickey Rivers I quit playing baseball either. I had my uncle Bob do it.
Football - I started playing football in 3rd grade and loved it. I excelled and surprisingly found myself as one of the very elite football youth league players in Miami' inner city leagues (all of the inner city and 'hood' football Pop Warner programs). Basically almost every black football player who would go on to play college football and onward to the NFL my age I played against or with (Michael Timpson, Brett Perryman, Godfrey Myles, etc). However, there was a guy named Johnny Lewis (JL) in my neighborhood who went to Oklahoma (OU) and started as their nose guard back in the late 70's/early 80's. He was friends with my uncle Bob and would come by my house when he was home from OU. He told coach Switzer I was the 'next best thing' and all of a sudden I'm getting mail from Oklahoma in 6th grade at my house and school. Every time Oklahoma was in town for the Orange Bowl and JL was on the team I'd go meet Coach Switzer, go to their practices, meet all of the players, go to the games, etc. So from the 6th grade I began to get mail and was offered by OU football coaches. Even had Buster Rhymes who knew some other family members speak about how great OU was. I was OU bound until 11th grade, that's when it happened. My FSU love affair started.
11th grade I'm playing for legendary coach Walt Frazier and I start telling everyone who would listen about FSU. There was no internet, there was no games on TV that I saw (except them playing against OU a few years earlier in a bowl game). Honestly, nobody in Miami knew about FSU football back in 82, 83. I literally woke up one morning BEFORE my 11th grade year even started and told my Mom I wanted to go to FSU. It was a 100% GUT feeling that my 1985 Sr. class would be the class to do it and that this school would be the new OU. I could not find any FSU gear anywhere in Miami. So, I would try to go the local library to get the Democrat. Anything I could read on FSU, which was little to nothing available. My 12th grade year and I'm being recruited heavily as a Free Safety, but my grades and SAT score are horrible. I'm ruled NOT eligible to accept a D1 or D1AA offer by NCAA. I have to go to JUCO to get a AA degree to compete at D1 program. Well all of the schools cooled on me which I didn't care anyway. OU wanted me to go to NE Oklahoma JC but I had cooled on OU by then, and only wanted one thing - an FSU offer. Coach Chuck Amato told my HS coach about a guy named Bubba Hooker who was the HC of Marion Military Institute (MMI) a Junior College in Alabama. Those 2 (Amato and Hooker) were friends because they coached together on the same staff at NC State under Lou Holtz. So I signed with MMI with the condition that I get my AA degree and I had a full ride to FSU to play DB.
JUCO -I get to MMI and on the very first day of summer practice AFTER running 100 wind sprints in 100 degree Alabama heat on a grass football field in football cleats I run a 4.59 in 40. Yes, they counted all 100 sprints and then told us now we time you in the 40. They move me to CB the next day (field) as I was the fastest guy on defense. Never before played corner in my life before JUCO. I measured 6"2' 190lbs with a 35 VJ and benched 225lbs 19times. I actually ran 4.45's in high school but I was dog tired after running 100 freaking sprints. We played all D1 JV teams and a few other programs. I was dominant. We went 11-0 and I was the field corner covering the opposing team best WR's. Funny story - there was a guy on my JUCO team named Brooks and he would tell me there was a guy back home in Ft. Meyers named Deon Sanders who he thought was better than me, myself along with my other 5 friends from Miami who I talked into going with me to this JUCO told him "you are crazy!" I had like 35 tackles 4 picks 8 PBU's and 1TD. From the JUCO I started being recruited and visited Auburn (I spoke to Bo Jackson), Florida (they down talked FSU so I immediately eliminated them although the campus was beautiful and the girls were friendly!!) Georgia Tech, and many more. We played at UCF against their JV and from there we finally visited FSU. 100 players from MMI get off the bus to tour the school and they stop me with Garnet and Gold girls and a coach and tell me to follow the FSU coaches upstairs and fill out some paper work (the other 99 JUCO players went on some nickel tour) but I saw and met Coach Bowden and saw a board. On the board it had this guy named Deon Sanders on it and he was at field corner. I promptly told the coach that's where I play field corner and the coach responded to me "we are recruiting you to play boundary corner" and "Deon has that side locked up". Here's this damn name again and they must think he's better than me. FSU coached told me they were pleased and happy with my and felt I would be an All American opposite Deon at boundary corner under the tutelage of Mickey Andrews....See new thread FSU...My Own Story - Part #2
BEFORE FSU - Baseball was my first love and a guy named Mickey Rivers who played for the Yankees was a good friend of my uncle Bob. Mickey taught me how to play baseball as a little kid in 1st grade and I would spend time with him at the local baseball park, as well as go to the Yankees spring training that they had here in S. Florida at the time. From 1st grade through 9th grade I made every All Star team there is to make in baseball as a Center fielder and Frist Baseman in the competitive Miami Baseball leagues. In fact I played at the same youth baseball park with Danny Tartabull (former Royal and Yankees) and his younger brother Jose who was my age. Danny, Jose and their Father spent countless hours trying to convince me to focus solely only on baseball and give up playing football when I was young because they said I was so skilled and gifted in the field and running the bases as a youngster. They wanted me to travel with them for their winter baseball club (like a AAU baseball team). Danny, Jose and several of the players I played with went onto to win a Baseball State Championship for our local high school team Miami Carol City (several of those same players went onto play in the big leagues). l quit in the 9th grade to focus on football (thanks to Oklahoma -Barry Switzer). Funny thing, a few years after high school I remember Jose (Danny's little brother who was my age) telling me there was a guy in the Seattle Mariners farm system on his team (I think either AA or AAA at the time) who played just like me and to remember his name...Ken Grifffey!. By the way, I never had the guts to tell Mickey Rivers I quit playing baseball either. I had my uncle Bob do it.
Football - I started playing football in 3rd grade and loved it. I excelled and surprisingly found myself as one of the very elite football youth league players in Miami' inner city leagues (all of the inner city and 'hood' football Pop Warner programs). Basically almost every black football player who would go on to play college football and onward to the NFL my age I played against or with (Michael Timpson, Brett Perryman, Godfrey Myles, etc). However, there was a guy named Johnny Lewis (JL) in my neighborhood who went to Oklahoma (OU) and started as their nose guard back in the late 70's/early 80's. He was friends with my uncle Bob and would come by my house when he was home from OU. He told coach Switzer I was the 'next best thing' and all of a sudden I'm getting mail from Oklahoma in 6th grade at my house and school. Every time Oklahoma was in town for the Orange Bowl and JL was on the team I'd go meet Coach Switzer, go to their practices, meet all of the players, go to the games, etc. So from the 6th grade I began to get mail and was offered by OU football coaches. Even had Buster Rhymes who knew some other family members speak about how great OU was. I was OU bound until 11th grade, that's when it happened. My FSU love affair started.
11th grade I'm playing for legendary coach Walt Frazier and I start telling everyone who would listen about FSU. There was no internet, there was no games on TV that I saw (except them playing against OU a few years earlier in a bowl game). Honestly, nobody in Miami knew about FSU football back in 82, 83. I literally woke up one morning BEFORE my 11th grade year even started and told my Mom I wanted to go to FSU. It was a 100% GUT feeling that my 1985 Sr. class would be the class to do it and that this school would be the new OU. I could not find any FSU gear anywhere in Miami. So, I would try to go the local library to get the Democrat. Anything I could read on FSU, which was little to nothing available. My 12th grade year and I'm being recruited heavily as a Free Safety, but my grades and SAT score are horrible. I'm ruled NOT eligible to accept a D1 or D1AA offer by NCAA. I have to go to JUCO to get a AA degree to compete at D1 program. Well all of the schools cooled on me which I didn't care anyway. OU wanted me to go to NE Oklahoma JC but I had cooled on OU by then, and only wanted one thing - an FSU offer. Coach Chuck Amato told my HS coach about a guy named Bubba Hooker who was the HC of Marion Military Institute (MMI) a Junior College in Alabama. Those 2 (Amato and Hooker) were friends because they coached together on the same staff at NC State under Lou Holtz. So I signed with MMI with the condition that I get my AA degree and I had a full ride to FSU to play DB.
JUCO -I get to MMI and on the very first day of summer practice AFTER running 100 wind sprints in 100 degree Alabama heat on a grass football field in football cleats I run a 4.59 in 40. Yes, they counted all 100 sprints and then told us now we time you in the 40. They move me to CB the next day (field) as I was the fastest guy on defense. Never before played corner in my life before JUCO. I measured 6"2' 190lbs with a 35 VJ and benched 225lbs 19times. I actually ran 4.45's in high school but I was dog tired after running 100 freaking sprints. We played all D1 JV teams and a few other programs. I was dominant. We went 11-0 and I was the field corner covering the opposing team best WR's. Funny story - there was a guy on my JUCO team named Brooks and he would tell me there was a guy back home in Ft. Meyers named Deon Sanders who he thought was better than me, myself along with my other 5 friends from Miami who I talked into going with me to this JUCO told him "you are crazy!" I had like 35 tackles 4 picks 8 PBU's and 1TD. From the JUCO I started being recruited and visited Auburn (I spoke to Bo Jackson), Florida (they down talked FSU so I immediately eliminated them although the campus was beautiful and the girls were friendly!!) Georgia Tech, and many more. We played at UCF against their JV and from there we finally visited FSU. 100 players from MMI get off the bus to tour the school and they stop me with Garnet and Gold girls and a coach and tell me to follow the FSU coaches upstairs and fill out some paper work (the other 99 JUCO players went on some nickel tour) but I saw and met Coach Bowden and saw a board. On the board it had this guy named Deon Sanders on it and he was at field corner. I promptly told the coach that's where I play field corner and the coach responded to me "we are recruiting you to play boundary corner" and "Deon has that side locked up". Here's this damn name again and they must think he's better than me. FSU coached told me they were pleased and happy with my and felt I would be an All American opposite Deon at boundary corner under the tutelage of Mickey Andrews....See new thread FSU...My Own Story - Part #2
